the story of noah and his ark is one of the bible's best-known and best-loved. So, we came here to the netherlands, crisscrossed by canals and sitting below sea level where people live under the constant t of flooding. We had heard a modern-day noah had done something extraordinary. ♪ thanks for having us to your ark. To be frank, I never thought I'd say that to anybody. He built himself is own biblical So that was a rooster? It was a rooster. So what animals have you got in your ark? Plastic animals. Not quite like noah. Yeah, no. He had real animals. In fact, it was a real flood that inspire d mr. Huibers, a born again christian to build this ark. He nearly drowned in a storm surge in 1992 and the next day a book caught his eye among the wreckage. It was a big book, the ark of noah, I bought it and we are looking at the book and I said, wow, I'm going to build the ark of noah. My children were excited and they run to my wife. What did your wife say? She was not happy with it. Women are sensible. Yeah. It took 13 years to get permission. It took you 13 years to convince her? Exactly. You must have really believed inthis. 100%. It took him just over four years to build his ark and he even used the bible as a blueprint. 50 elbow is the width and -- when you say elbow? From here. Cubit? I took my cubit, nobody knows how big noah was at that time. According to the bible, noah spent 120 years on his ark. And it's every child's favorite story when the flood finally did come he was ready. God sends two of every animal, all of them, two of every single one. Came on to a ship from the giraffe to ants to bears. Rained for 40 days and 40 nights. And finally the whole entire earth was flooded. Adam is 17 years old and as fantastic as the noah story sounds, even tonight, not far from 's home in new york, people are still trying to cope with the aftermath of hurricane sandy. And it seems that whether it was seven weeks ago in the united states or 7,000 years ago when a wave washes away the home that you built that children and the community you love, the first question we all ask is why. Life often seems inexplicable and we need to make sense of it. We need something that will help you to assuage your grief and anguish and rage. These biblical stories are a way of finding meaning. When I was younger, the story was kind of a fairy tale for me. I think that when you get older, you kind of see the sad nas and the sorrow in the story. Because lots of people die in this flood. Destroying the earth, the bible tells us, is the only thing god ever regrets so he sends a rainbow as a promise. This rainbow shows that god will never send a flood again to hurt humanity and all of the animals that live on this earth. What happens next is left out of the colorful pages of storybooks. Noah comes out of the ark and he plants a vineyard and gets drunk. I was remembering a story of a holocaust survivor whot home to his village and found everyone had gone. He said I could understand exactly why noah got drunk. If you imagine what it would have been like after the flood. Devastation, all of the swollen, bloated bodies around. Terrible. And it turns out the flood stories like this are not unique to the bible. They can be found all over the ancient world. These stories didn't drop from heaven one day in a clump of words all sent by god in book form. These stories developed in a certain place and time. Leading some archaeologists to believe they are based on real events. People do not make these things up. So, does this mean we've got a flood back, way back in antiquity? It may well. The story is created to explain something that happened. But in the biblical account the story is layered with new meaning. The flood is sent as a punishment for people's sins. Hurricane katrina was the judgment of god. I don't know how much god has to do we had an earthquake and hurricane, he said are you agoing to start listening to me here? You know even today some christians will say that the tsunamis and the floods are retribution from god for since committed today. Some christians say that. I don't know on what basis they would say it. In the world sometimes god allows things to happen, it doesn't mean he's judging people. But johann isn't so sure. Do you believe he'll do it again? World one not anymore but small ones. Small places might be wiped away. Like new york. Not a small place. Big, big disaster that time. Does that frighten you? Yeah. I'so the promise of god that it is in his hands. I feel like the moral of the story, for me, helping others will make the world a better place. And a better place for myself will be a better place for everyone. And for my children and for xhiemy children's children and that's the kind of world I want to live noah tells us about.

This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.

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